


Deleted Scenes from Competitive Domestic Arts

by Ilthit



Series: Trope-Bingo: Round Two [5]
Category: Community (TV)
Genre: Baking, Chaptered, Cooking, Deleted Scenes, Domestic, Eating Disorders, Ficlet, Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-07-07
Updated: 2013-09-13
Packaged: 2017-12-18 00:52:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 1,934
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/873833
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ilthit/pseuds/Ilthit
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Rejected tidbits from an episode we never saw.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Practice Makes Passable

**Author's Note:**

  * For [tootsiemuppet](https://archiveofourown.org/users/tootsiemuppet/gifts).



> Also decided this will do nicely for Trope-Bingo's square "food porn".

Abed was not interested in cooking as a theory or as an art form.

He liked following the steps that turned noodles from crunchy to limp and spicy. He didn’t mind mixing falafel, or the splash and sizzle of a container hitting hot oil. That’s where he liked it to end.

The problem with cooking outside the production line of a fast food restaurant was the endless variability. When Annie and Troy did it, they plunged the kitchen into chaos. Annie picked recipes that used “pinch” as a legitimate unit of measurement. Troy was even worse — he had a frankly liberal approach to instructions altogether. “You can tell when it’s done when you start to smell it,” he’d said once. Unacceptable. Abed had learned to be patient on cooking days, and more specifically to leave his roommates to it. He’d draw the sheet-curtains, put on his headphones and rewatch early episodes of Happy Days until the whole thing was over.

“And we really have to do this together?” Abed asked, even though he knew the answer. He would have just ducked out, but since Jeff had upped the stakes in the Community College Doubles Bake-Off against City College, he and Troy had to make something at least vaguely cake-shaped to get Chang and Shirley into the finals or Britta might lose her fall semester’s Psych grades. It was a downside of the genre.

They decided to practice at home to establish a routine for the big day on the quad.

1\. Gather the materials.

First crisis: They did not have any coriander. “I thought you said you’d picked the simplest recipe you could find on the internet.”

“Coriander’s optional. Look.”

2\. Mix ingredients.

“Which setting on this mixer translates to ‘brisk’?”

“Just let me do it, Abed.”

“I can’t let you do everything. You already ran to the shop for coriander. I’ll use the second highest setting.”

Abed read the instructions again, and Troy rummaged in the counter drawers. Just as Abed was affixing the dough arms, Troy came up with a marker and a roll of masking tape. The settings I, II and III were relabeled to ‘careful’, ‘brisk’ and ‘???’.

3\. Bake.

“This thing is brilliant.”

“The egg-timer? We’ve had that since we moved in. You wanna set it?”

Abed hesitated. He didn’t like being bad at things, but he also didn’t like letting this stuff stop him, so he slowly moved the upper shell to the right until the marker rested on the number 25.

Second crisis: The egg-timer rang. It had been 25 minutes, but Troy said the cake needed more time to bake.

“If it was 30 minutes, they would have said 30 minutes. I know we preheated that oven.”

“I think our oven must be a little old. Or maybe it’s too new. The recipe could be from any old book. I don’t know why one oven bakes things faster than another!”

“Then _you_ should have said 30 minutes.” Abed paced around the island one more time. 

“Okay, I’m taking it out. It’s close en— It’s fine. F-Y-N-E. Look.”

The hot pan hit the dish counter with a sizzle. A pale, flat, orange-brown cake sat still for a moment before the middle part sank down.

They looked at each other. “Cover it with frosting?”

“I'm sorry I snapped at you, but I need a minute.” Abed retreated into the pillow fort.

4\. Decorate.

“So it went well?”asked Annie from the doorway to her room. “Can I come out? I have a thing with Rich at the soup kitchen.”

“The B plot,” said Abed, without breaking his concentration on the knife spreading frosting evenly along the side. “Yeah, sure.”

“He’s been doing that for ten minutes. We’ll only have two tomorrow, at best.”

“Maybe I can talk to Jeff.”

“I’m in the room, guys. It’s my decision too. I know what to expect now. It will be fine.”

“Yeah,” said Troy doubtfully. “With an I.”

Later, while they helped Annie on her diorama and the other two had already got the confessions ball rolling on the subject of hair clumps in the shower, Abed said, “I might tell Britta I have issues with cooking because I haven’t had anyone cook for me at home since my parents got divorced.”

“Aww, Abed!”

“Is that true?”

“No, but I think it will make her happy.”

The Bake-Off was a disaster, but at the end of the day they all learned something. That was an upside of the genre.


	2. Magical Friendship Hats Got Nothing on the Mom Voice

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I wasn't going to write more of these, but then [this ficathon](http://hlwim.livejournal.com/2009.html) happened.

  
"That is the third time I've caught you doing that today," said Shirley. "Is there something you'd like to talk about?"

"There's nothing to talk about," said Jeff.

"Let me rephrase. Let's talk about this so we can get back to practicing for the big Bake-Off tomorrow. Why do you keep looking at yourself in every reflective surface in the kitchen and squeezing the skin stretched over your abs?"

"It's flab, Shirley. It's definitely flab."

"Don't be ridiculous, Jeffrey."

"It is. I don't know what I was thinking entering into a speed-eating contest. I don't have the metabolism of a 20-year-old anymore."

"You look great, Jeff."

"You don't know what it's like, Shirley. I have to be healthy or I have nothing. You've got Andre, and you want someone like Andre, but me? No hot girl is going to look past my receding gums unless I keep this machine perfectly tuned."

"Lord help me," Shirley prayed.

They only had another 12 hours to prepare, and Shirley's Sandwiches was much too fragile and new an enterprise to survive a humiliating defeat in an inter-college Doubles Bake-Off. She took a brisk whisk to the dough for a moment so Bad Shirley had time to slink back to her corner and give Good Shirley the reigns so she could take care of her friend.

Once the dough was safely rising in the fridge, Shirley wiped her hands and clasped them. "Jeffrey?"

Jeff let go of his stomach and turned away from the black mirror of the oven door.

"What can you tell me was wrong with what you just said?"

He blinked at her. "That I said it to a, er, to you?"

"Wrong. I'm magnificent and I know you think so too."

Jeff couldn't deny it.

"Okay... Because there's an Andre for me out there somewhere? I know you're not telling me women aren't shallow."

"Try again."

"Look, I will always hang my self-esteem on my charm and what I can get with it. That's not going to change just because you give me a few wise words over baking paper and oven mitts."

"It's not that either."

"Okay, now I really am stumped."

"You used the word healthy to mean skinny."

"Oh."

"Mm-hmm."

"Well, it kinda--"

"Uh-uh. Don't."

"But--"

"No. I'm not the one with the heightened cholesterol levels here. I may not be a med student, but I have three kids and you can bet your tight ass I've read every health omnibus out there just to be prepared. If you don't eat regularly, you increase your risk of heart disease. You increase your risk of liver failure. And yes, you even increase your chances of getting fat."

Jeff's expression was a fixed stone mask, but he made an almost inaudible sound at the back of his throat.

"Don't do any more speed-eating contests, or do. That's up to you. But I know you're too damn smart to trade your health for more sixpack definition. There's a limit, Jeffrey. Keep your eye on it.

"Yes, ma'am."

"Good. Now mix me my frosting. We'll have to time it to under 60 seconds."


	3. Baked Goods as Protest Art

The table in Study Room F was laden with an array of partially destroyed baked goods. The walls rang with the familiar sound of high-pitched shouting.

"High horse? You would never have even found out about the soup kitchen if Rich hadn't mentioned it!"

"At least I know I'm fucked-up! You're always trying so hard to be normal with your cardigans and your twelve-step-plan and straight As! You want to be normal, I'm stuck with it!"

Annie's arms flew to her sides, fists balled tightly and knuckles white. She had never took a swing at anyone but Jeff, but the motion was already coiled in her elbow. "Well, I have some good news for you. You just entered pornographic cupcakes filled with fake blood for a Community College Bake-Off. Whatever you are, it is not normal!"

Shirley pursed her mouth and shook her head, her curls shuddering vigorously. "I thought we agreed never to mention those abominations again."

"If I won't point out the sexism inherent in forcing a smart, independent psych major to bake cupcakes for grades, then who will? Protest art is a valid--"

"There is something wrong with you, Britta. I will pray for you once I find it in my heart to forgive you but it will take some time, I think you should know that."

"This Bake-Off has been the worst idea since Ceasar Salad Day. I don't even care if Britta thinks that I think I'm better than everyone else, I baked the winning entry and this time I demand to be recognized for it."

"Even if it means your friend loses her grades?" Shirley asked.

That shut the room up. On top of one cake, a gelatin elephant rippled lightly in echo. Britta dropped herself into a chair. Annie took a step back.

Britta was the first to break the silence. "It's okay. You're right. I can't take the credit. Annie won that contest, not me. If Duncan and the Dean say it means I have to start over, I can do that. The longer I study the better shot I'll have at becoming a decent therapist, right?"

"Oh, Britta." Annie twisted her fingers. "I can't make you... not for a stupid contest. I just wanted you to appreciate me for once."

"Annie, you're the most amazingly competent person I know. I mean, you can bake a contest-winning five-layer-cake, feed the poor and ace a pop quiz in the same day. I can barely change the litter box and get my shoes on in the morning. You remind me that I should be better and I yell at you because it's easier than being mad at myself. I suck."

"You don't suck! You do things I'd never have the guts to do. I wish I was the kind of person who would bake blood cupcakes just to prove a point."

"I am warning you two," said Shirley.

Annie held out her arms, and Britta sprang up and into them.

"Shirley, I'm sorry about the cupcakes," Britta said tearily over Annie's shoulder. "And for implying baking isn't smart or independent. It's your career and I should respect that."

"Thank you, Britta."

"And I'm sorry you and Jeff's cake didn't make it to the finals even though you were clearly the best baker in the competition," said Annie.

"Aww, sweetie." Shirley's face broke into a reluctant smile, and she walked into the reaching arms of the other two women.

Outside the study room, Abed peered between the cracks in the drawn blinds. "Okay, I think they're done now. 18 minutes and 40 seconds." Jeff held out his hand. Pierce swore and counted a wad of bills on it.

"Now can we go in and have some cake?" asked Troy, dropping the folded piece of paper he had been balancing on his nose.

"Give it a minute," said Jeff, counting his winnings. "We've got a bonus round on the duration of the group hug."

Abed restarted his stopwatch.


End file.
